Meaning viewed through semiotic model of differences and oppositions
that structure the possible cultural significance of work

Viability of the "semiotic square" of oppositions and
differentiations in analyzing art in a social context: network of
relations is more complex than simple oppositional model.

Intertextuality: a model for "intermediality": art making
and art interpreting in contexts of prior work, traditions, codes,
and values assumed by interpretive community.

Intertextuality refers to the network of content and code interdependencies
for meaning, prior and concurrent works presupposed for the intelligibility
of the work being viewed

What do the art works themselves and the "communities of
practice" or "communities of reception" unconsciously
presuppose about prior and contemporary work through which (and
only through which) the work is intelligible?

A text is intelligible only through "a mosaic of references
and quotations that have lost their origins" (Kristeva's definition
of intertextuality). Art works are similar in mosaics of implied
references and responses.

What is already encoded, part of a cultural encyclopedia, prior
to anyone's interpretation (Eco).

Now we have "intermediation" (all media, beyond intertextuality):
network of presupposed prior and contemporary works through which
anything is interpreted.

Semiosis: art works in ongoing chain or dialogue of interpretations
and responses; meaning produced through semiotic structure like language
and other symbolic forms.

"The interpretation of a text will always take the form of
another text." (Eco)

Translated to art: "The interpretation of an art work will
always the take form of another work.

New works as interpretations of prior or contemporary works
(semiosis).

Applied mediology

status/role/function of the material art object in a digital and
post-Internet world

social value of the "dematerialized" media of video
and digital multimedia

Self-aware internationalization of the artworld, 1990s-2005

Where are the art/culture power centers today?

Superficially "decentered," the artworld reconfigures
around New York, Berlin, London.

Rise of Beijing and Asian nodes: More Asian artists establishing international identity.

Major transitions in the artworld, 1960s-2005

Moving art off the walls and pedestals and into "lived space"
or deconstructed gallery space in 1960s-80s

Galleries, dealers making a market in modern art works mainly in
NY and Paris. Wealthy collectors establish market value of new artists.
Museums establishing collections of "modern" works. Post-war
boom in art work and shift in power to New York.

Economics: art market expands with growth in demographics in artworld
players and growth of commercial art market. More aspiring artists
entering the scene, colleges churning out thousands of BFAs/MFAs
looking for market validation.

Galleries/ dealers making a market in first-wave postmodern works,
artists and dealers begin selling more to museums and corporate
or wealthy collector collections (Saatchi, Broad, etc.).

Art as heroic struggle with tradition, overcoming tradition but
new work understood in context of grand narrative of art and cultural
history.

Distrust of metanarratives (Lyotard); suspicion of ideological
agendas in "Western Art" paradigms; deconstruction of
traditional art media and genres. Rise of feminism and identity
politics as challenge to artworld roles and functions of art.

Sense of triumphalism in modernism: Greenberg's
Hegelian narrative of end-point of art in self-aware, self-critical
art genres (painting, sculpture). Supreme goals of painting and sculpture
believed to be achieved in modern, self-critical works.

Rejection of old triumphalism and signs
of a new triumphalism of movements seen to destroy the illusions of
modernism (Pop, minimalism, conceptual art, feminist art, outside
art, graffiti art).

An anti-triumphalism triumphalism, a sense of relief or release
from grand art-historical problems and struggles, with continuing
distrust, and need to ignore, dominant cultures.

Rise of "ignorant art": art making purposely ignorant
of past and predecessors.

Art as "about" the formal and material problems of a
medium (painting, sculpting, etc.) and a commentary on the making
and limits of art in a specific medium. Abstraction privileged over
representational art.

Adoption of mechanical techniques and commercial image styles,
removal of visible artistís "hand," use of industrial
materials. Rise in acceptance of photography and video in "high
art" contexts. "Death of painting."

Continuation of art as embedded in social
critique, works that question position and identities, multiplying
of media and spaces. Photography, video, installations over painting
and traditional sculpture.

Artists as visionary outsiders needing the art business world for
survival and communication of ideas.

Artists and art begin taking role of religion and myth in secular,
materialist world. Many artists identifying with the spiritual or
transcendental. Other engaged in political resistance to capitalist
economics and class system.

Cynical/ironic embrace of art business machine (Warhol), artists
as pop stars and celebrities.

Self-conscious ironization or parody of modernism and accumulated
cultural "givens."

Clash of discourses and movements in establishing the identity
and goals of art and artists. Fragmentation and pluralism.

Art becoming seen as performative acts by artists more than finished
objects for business transactions.